FOLLOWING apologies for absence and news of members, we settled back to learn about drones from our guest speaker, consultant engineer Paul Whiting of Offenham.

Rex, Derek and Pat were relieved to hear that drones did not refer to the noise usually emanating from the back of the meeting room but rather to Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. Most of us had heard about the military use of these drones but far fewer had actually seen an example at first hand.

Paul had brought along a variety of these drones, including fairly large and other tiny ones that he had built himself. He explained the regulations applied to these, whereby anything up to 7 kilograms was unrestricted up to a height of 400 feet and that those over 20 kilos were regarded as light aircraft. Drones can either be fixed wing or rotary and the tiny nano ones were extremely light and about the size of a small tin of tuna which he flew around the room to the delight of Jim. A view of this flight is now on our website - www.eveshamprobus.co.uk

Apart from military, drones can be used for communications, targeting, photography, search and rescue, surveying and building inspection. Further development will enable drones to be used for traffic management, crop monitoring aerial surveillance and even critical deliveries like blood. He showed us footage of building surveys which prompted some of us to wonder why drones hadn’t been used to survey Evesham’s clock tower.

We had numerous questions for Paul, including about the costs involved, the possible misuse, and dangers to aircraft.

John Cotton thanked Paul on our behalf for this fascinating insight and remarked on his own experience in agriculture of the use of GPS and this sort of technology.

Our history buffs will be pleased to relive Agincourt on October 22 followed by Pegasus Bridge on October 29. Do join us.

CHRIS DONOUGH